Natural capital The problems:

8.1.2 Natural capital The problems:

Declining resource section 6.3.1 and section 6.3.6 ‘natural assets’. Interview responses highlighted that the vast majority of fishers perceive that fish stocks have declined substantially over the last 20 years. There are specific alleged incidences of pollution from palm oil factories, bombing of coral reefs, cutting down of mangroves and an increasing use of fish aggregating devices FADs to maintain catches. Lack of monitoring and evaluation section 6.3.4 natural field. Despite a case for resource decline based on perceptions of stakeholders, there is very little monitoring and evaluation that could verify this. A lack of reliable fisheries statistics including catch-per-unit-effort measures make it difficult to compare current returns with previous years. Inadequate conservation measures. Because it is not known if stocks are being harvested sustainably or not it is not possible to assess if conservation measures are necessary. Based on perceptions of the majority of fishers, stocks that used to be close to the shore are now much harder to find section 6.3.3 and the lucrative snapper and grouper species are considerably smaller. There have been a handful of small-scale habitat rehabilitation initiatives for mangroves and coral reefs but there are few marine protected areas and a lack of fishing gear restrictions. The solutions: Use fisher groups to collect fisheries data. One of the main reasons why there is little monitoring and evaluation is the cost. Coastal fisheries in West Sumatra are mostly conducted by small vessels based in villages scattered on a coastline of hundreds of kilometres. Surveys are costly and there are not the personnel to conduct them. This is precisely why fishers themselves should be incentivized to collect their own catch-per-unit effort data. One of the conditions for a fisher group receiving aid should be that they are prepared to collect data about the number of days they fish and the catch volume and value that they land. These data could form the basis of monitoring to assess the health of the stocks and whether further fisheries conservation measures are necessary. The group in Tiku has already begun to do a simple version of this. Dissemination of results from monitoring and proactive co-management measures. Once the state of the resource is known, fishers themselves can be involved in a management process using their own data. If stocks are healthy and further expansion is possible then physical assets fishing gear, outboards, vessels can be given to increase fishing effort. If stocks are already declining then these data can be used to show fishers themselves that further expansion of effort is counterproductive, that conservation measures such as MPAs or gear mesh restrictions are necessary and that government aid needs to be targeted away from increasing fishing effort. Whether data indicating the health of the stocks is collated by the fishermen or through independent surveys it is crucial to have a better understanding of the health of the stocks. Many of the communities interviewed as part of this research are highly dependent on fisheries and stock declines may force these communities down a blind alley.

8.1.3 Human capital The problems: